Cloudflare Review

It improved the speed of my site significantly, reducing the page loading times to appropriate levels, but there were a few times when some of their CDN nodes would fail.

What is most valuable?

CDN

Security

How has it helped my organization?

One of my projects, ancient-origins.net, gets 3 million views per month, so serving the page fast is an important element. Using the CDN of Cloudflare improved the speed significantly, reducing the page loading times to appropriate levels. Additionally their security features make sure to block attacks on our site.

What needs improvement?

Their CDN features, although good, still lack in speed in comparison to their competitors (e.g. Incapsula, MaxCDN, etc.).

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using it for almost one year.

What was my experience with deployment of the solution?

No issues with the deployment. Their process is pretty simple and fast.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

Yes, there were a few times when some of their CDN nodes would fail, creating serious speed issues with the site without any warning or notification from their side. Also, many times, even if our server is working properly, Cloudflare would report it as being down.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

No scalability issues so far.

How are customer service and technical support?

Customer Service:

I would give them a 9/10. They respond pretty fast to requests.

Technical Support:

I would give an 8/10 to their technical support. We haven’t had many issues, but when we do, it appears that sometimes they are not willing to look deeper into them to try and find a solution.

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We used MaxCDN, but we switched to Cloudflare because MaxCDN lacks security features.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is pretty straightforward and doesn’t require any technical knowledge, since everything is done on their site.

What about the implementation team?

The implementation was done in-house, since it is a simple process.

What was our ROI?

This is difficult to calculate; however, improving the page loading speed always impacts the traffic on a site positively.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The original setup cost was zero, and the monthly cost is around $30 for three sites using the Business Cloudflare plan.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We evaluated MaxCDN and Incapsula.

What other advice do I have?

If your budget is low, then Cloudflare is the only cost effective solution, at least to begin with. The best combination of CDN and security features at a low price. At a slightly higher budget, Incapsula may be a better solution especially since they provide a faster CDN and better security features.

**Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.